Wire-webapp Cross-site Scripting

Wire is a secure messaging application. Wire is vulnerable to arbitrary HTML and Javascript execution via insufficient escaping when rendering `@mentions` in the wire-webapp. If a user receives and views a malicious message, arbitrary code is injected and executed in the context of the victim allowing the attacker to fully control the user account. Wire-desktop clients that are connected to a vulnerable wire-webapp version are also vulnerable to this attack. The issue has been fixed in wire-webapp 2022-05-04-production.0 and is already deployed on all Wire managed services. On-premise instances of wire-webapp need to be updated to docker tag 2022-05-04-production.0-v0.29.7-0-a6f2ded or wire-server 2022-05-04 (chart/4.11.0) or later. No known workarounds exist. (2022-06-25, CVE-2022-29168)

wire-webapp is the web application interface for the wire messaging service. Insufficient escaping in markdown “code highlighting” in the wire-webapp resulted in the possibility of injecting and executing arbitrary HTML code and thus also JavaScript. If a user receives and views such a malicious message, arbitrary code is injected and executed in the context of the victim. This allows the attacker to fully control the user account. Wire-desktop clients that are connected to a vulnerable wire-webapp version are also vulnerable to this attack. The issue has been fixed in wire-webapp 2022-03-30-production.0 and is already deployed on all Wire managed services. On-premise instances of wire-webapp need to be updated to docker tag 2022-03-30-production.0-v0.29.2-0-d144552 or wire-server 2022-03-30 (chart/4.8.0), so that their applications are no longer affected. There are no known workarounds for this issue. ### Patches * The issue has been fixed in wire-webapp **2022-03-30-production.0** and is already deployed on all Wire managed services. * On-premise instances of wire-webapp need to be updated to docker tag **2022-03-30-production.0-v0.29.2-0-d144552** or wire-server **2022-03-30 (chart/4.8.0)**, so that their applications are no longer affected. ### Workarounds * No workarounds known ### For more information If you have any questions or comments about this advisory feel free to email us at [vulnerability-report@wire.com](mailto:vulnerability-report@wire.com) ### Credits We thank [Posix](https://twitter.com/po6ix) for reporting this vulnerability (2022-04-20, CVE-2022-24799)

wire-webapp is the web version of Wire, an open-source messenger. A cross-site scripting vulnerability exists in wire-webapp prior to version 2021-06-01-production.0. If a user is instructed to open an image in a new tab (right click -> open in new tab, or copy the URL and paste it in the URL bar), an the image payload is executed on the domain hosting the app (app.wire.com). In particular, if an image contains malicious code in addition to the actual picture, this code is executed on app.wire.com. This allows the attacker to fully control the user account. The vulnerability was patched in version 2021-06-01-production.0. As a workaround, users should not try to open image URLs. (2021-06-15, CVE-2021-32683)

Cross site scripting is an attack where a web page executes code that is injected by an adversary. It usually appears, when users input is presented. This attack can be used to impersonate a user, take over control of the session, or even steal API keys.

The attack can be executed e.g. when you application injects the request parameter directly into the HTML code of the page returned to the user:

https://server.com/confirmation?message=Transaction+Complete

what results in:

<span>Confirmation: Transaction Complete</span>

In that case the message can be modified to become a valid Javascript code, e.g.:

https://server.com/confirmation?message=<script>dangerous javascript code here</script>

and it will be executed locally by the user's browser with full access to the user's personal application/browser data:

<span>Confirmation: <script>dangerous javascript code here</script></span>